But when three enter together and draw lots with one another, two of them may depart laden with treasures, and only the third, upon whom the lot has fallen, must remain behind, and is torn in a thousand pieces by the demon.
Two men from some distant country had often entered the cave, and had always succeeded in enticing a third to accompany them, who always fell into the hands of the Gott-sei-bei-uns, since they so arranged it that the lot fell to him.
Finally, it struck the inhabitants as something very remarkable that those who had entered the cave with the two strangers never returned, and henceforth they failed to find a follower.
Then they entered the hut of a poor man in Dorf Osterhagen, who had a wife and eight children, and challenged him, with brilliant promises, to follow them into the cave.
The man, whose name was Schlosser, felt little inclination for the expedition, and absolutely refused, even if they offered him eighty Thaler.
But the wife called her husband into another room, and said to him: "Thou knowest that I love thee dearly, and would sink from sorrow and anguish if thou shouldst be torn from me; but we have eight children, and no bread in the cupboard, and no money, and with the money the strangers offer thee we should have enough for our whole lives; so go with them, and be sure no evil will befall thee."
And she opened a cupboard, took out a plant, sewed it in his shirt in three different places, made a sign of the cross above each place, and said, "That which I have sewed in thy shirt is origanum, a sure defence against all enchantment, and even the devil; so go in peace, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen."
And Schlosser embraced his wife and children, and went with the two men, who looked, scornfully laughing, at each other, after having laid eighty glittering new Thaler on the table.
They wandered on until they had reached the beam—the fatal beam—where they stood still, and the men warned Schlosser solemnly, if his life was dear to him, to utter no sound till they had passed the next two caves.
Schlosser promised, and the three crossed cautiously the dangerous bridge, and entered a cave filled with the most horrible vermin.